#HSFT19: Stop #11 — Baldwyn Bearcats

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BALDWYN, Miss. (WCBI) — The Baldwyn Bearcats have always been riddled with success.

After losing lots of experience, 2018 was the first time the Bearcats didn’t see a division championship.

Now after being reclassified to 1A the Bearcats hope to be the team to beat once again.

“I think the biggest thing is dropping down to 1A you have so many region games that you don’t have as many non-division games,” head coach Michael Gray said. “So that will help us going forward.”

“Even though we’re going down there’s still no reason to look down on any 1A team,” senior RB/LB Mark Rowan said. “We still gotta stay humble. That’s what messed us up last year. We weren’t humble enough. So we just have to go out there and even though it’s a new division, we still have to go out there and do our thing.”

As the Bearcats continue to rebuild, the experience they’ve lost in recent years Coach Gray continues to be impressed by the work ethic his team brings to practice every day.

“We had a really good spring,” Gray said. They pushed each other in the weight room. When they’re here they’re pushing each other to get better every day. With a young team that’s what you want to see because it will pay off eventually if they continue to work hard.”

“Last year was my first year starting out,” junior MLB/C Joseph Harper said. “Now I know where to go and what to do this year. This building as a whole team because we were a young team. It’s just helping us grow.”

Even though the rebuilding process is normal for most teams, after last season this Baldwyn team feels as though it’s playing with a chip on its shoulders.

“That 3-8 season last year you know we had some inexperienced players,” Rowan said. “Nobody wants to go 3-8, so that’s basically the goal. To have a better record than last year.”

After not making an appearance in the division championships after five straight, of course, another goal is to get back to that bearcat tradition.

“They got their feelings hurt last year,” Gray said. “We fought a lot of injuries early and we were not as athletic and skilled as we have been in the past. that was just graduation and injuries takes care of that. I think they got a little upset last year the way they finished the season so I think that’s a shot in the arm they’ll take with them.”

“A lot of people don’t know we’ve picked up this summer and how hard we have worked. So we just have to go out there and prove all the haters wrong,” Rowan said.

Baldwyn will begin to prove the haters wrong with its first match-up against Kossuth on August 23rd.